So It Goes
by mcmachine
Summary: Amidst all of the drama that the Minnick situation was creating at the hospital and tension in their personal lives, April's father has a heart attack and she has to return to Moline. Uninvited, Jackson shows up to hash things out.


"Jackson? Can you open up for just a minute?" April called out.

It was a nervous knock on his bedroom door. Nearing midnight, the two of them hadn't said a word to each other since they had gotten home. Harriet had been put down a few hours ago, they had eaten dinner separately as if one another didn't exist. The civil war going on at the hospital had been extended to the walls of their home and seemed unlikely to let up.

After the way that April had seemed to flip-flop, as far as Jackson was concerned, when the twisted opportunity for her to step up as head of general temporarily had come around, he had shut down. There she was, running away once again to do what she wanted instead of what he perceived to be the right thing. He hadn't tried to open up his mind enough to see her side of things. Truthfully, he had been too preoccupied and obsessed with the fact that he had found his father again to think more deeply about anything else going on in his life. For years, he hadn't known that he was alive and it hadn't mattered. But having Harriet here, everything was different. Including what he thought about the man who had left his mother and him.

The door opened about a foot wide, exhausted eyes glaring at her.

"What?" Jackson barked.

April sighed reflexively. "I'm catching the first flight to Moline in the morning. My dad had a heart attack and it's pretty bad." She explained through tight lips, teary gaze averted and staring just past him. "I already told Bailey. Just needed to make sure you can watch Harriet."

"Oh." Had she told Bailey before him? Why? "I– yeah, of course, I can watch her." Jackson's brows furrowed as he stared down at her. "Are you sure you don't want us to come with you?"

"My dad just had a massive MI. The last thing I need right now is you there." She snapped back.

Any other week in their life, and the harsh words would have been confusing and unfounded. But now, they made sense. Nothing about their relationship had been normal. April's family had never completely accepted the divorce between them especially with the timing of her pregnancy with Harriet. Plus, she was always stressed out whenever she had to be around her family for an extended period of time, reasonable cause or not. The last thing she would have wanted to compile on top of that was fighting with Jackson.

"Goodnight, Jackson." She said shortly, turning on her heels and folding her arms across her chest. "I'll see you in a few days." With any luck, she would be out of there in the morning before he could see her.

Standing in the doorway and staring at her for a long moment, he took a deep breath before finally shutting the door and laying down again for the night. It didn't seem right, letting her go at it alone, even if it was apparently what she wanted to do. Jackson knew how much she loved her parents. If it had been his mom, no matter what the circumstances were, he would have needed some support. If he wouldn't be able to see that for himself.

For a few minutes, he laid there weighing out the different options. April somehow was the slightly more peaceful of the two, typing in her credit card information and purchasing a very early morning flight to Columbus.

Only a couple of hours later, her alarm went off in the morning. April made quick work of getting dressed and throwing a few things in a bag that she thought she might need, not sure how many days she was going to be here. Bailey had told her to take a few, Hunt was already mostly on his own in the emergency room since she had been handling things in general – hopefully, it wouldn't make too much of a difference. A stop was made into Harriet's nursery to pick her up and kiss her sweetly, promising her that she would be back home as soon as she could be.

When Jackson woke up in the morning, his house was quiet. April was already gone, he discovered quickly upon peeking into her bedroom. He sighed, getting Harriet up and ready for the day. He knew that she didn't want him there from all of the fighting that they had been doing in the past few weeks. It made perfect sense, really.

But what if they could just put that aside?

Both of their days were spent inside of a hospital lost in thought, despite being hundreds of miles apart from one another. Both of them were thinking of their fathers, too.

Somehow, they were always on the same page.

April did not cry as much as she would have anticipated herself to. Even though there was a range of severity when it came to heart attacks and they were lucky that her father's had not been a fatal occurrence, and she had seen it many times in the emergency room, it was still an emotional thing for any family to go through. She was the one who ended up explaining most of it to her mother and sisters. The doctors at the hospital he went to weren't bad, but they wanted to hear it from her.

Dinnertime came and she was not nearly as hungry as she could hope to be. Her mom and sisters had gone to their family home for the night, but she had stayed at the hospital just a little bit longer than the rest of them. She felt guilty about leaving in the first place as she went back home.

Jackson had been the one who accused her of turning around on people who cared for her too quickly. All of the arguing that they had been doing lately, all she could hear was it echoing around her head again and again as he slept in his patient bed. She loved her father. She knew that Jackson didn't have the same relationship with his, that he didn't have one at all. He had been left behind. Maybe he still had issues now from that.

But he wasn't ready to give up on her, not just yet.

At the airport with two packed bags and Harriet in his arms, a quick exchange was being made with the attendant working the ticket counter in order to get the quickest and best possible tickets to Columbus. From there, he could rent a car to drive to Moline. He hadn't been to her family home in years, but he was sure that he could find his way again. That was a relatively low concern on his list of stress. He wasn't sure how April was going to react to having him there, let alone the rest of her family. Her sisters didn't like him from the start, it seemed, and her parents hadn't since the divorce between the two of them. But he knew that he needed to be there for her and that she would be happy to see Harriet, at least. She always cheered her up.

It was dark outside when he as finally behind the wheel of the rental car with Harriet in the backseat, foot to the pedal and getting to Moline as quickly as he could. He didn't know if Moline actually had a hospital, but he could at least get to the house.

With Harriet on his hip, he took a deep breath as he stepped up the porch steps to their farmhouse. A slight pause was taken before he knocked on the door.

"Jackson Avery? Is that really you?" Mrs. Kepner questioned as she opened the door.

"Yeah, it is. Hi, Karen." Although under normal circumstances after the divorce he probably would not have, he stepped forward and placed a kiss on her cheek. He knew that she had to be going through a difficult time right now, too. "How is he doing?"

"Okay," she answered with a teary smile. "That's what April said, at least. She didn't say you were coming."

"She didn't know," he admitted. "She asked if I would stay in Seattle and watch Harriet. I said I would originally but the more I thought about it, the more I knew I needed to be here. I hope you don't mind the imposition."

Karen smiled, shaking her head. "Not at all. As long as you give me my grandbaby."

"Of course," Jackson said with a slight chuckle. He stepped forward and followed her into the house, passing Harriet over to her. The little girl didn't recognize her maternal grandmother quite as easily as she did her paternal merely because she didn't see her nearly as often given all of the miles between them, but she didn't cry or resist a word upon being held over. There was a little bit of immediate joy replacing some of the tiring exhaustion on his former mother-in-law's feature from holding her granddaughter, he could see that easily. He smiled just a moment before asking, "Is April in her room?"

"Oh, no," Karen answered. "She's still at the hospital with her father. Would you like something to eat?"

Despite the divorce on the table, there was no animosity inside of the household. Not with Karen or any of the Kepner sisters. All of them easily put things aside for the sake of the father in the hospital. Admittedly, it was a pain Jackson couldn't imagine. If he had found out Robert Avery had nearly died or even died, he was sure that he wouldn't have quite the same emotional reaction that they were all having. He still had plenty of hate for the man, all these years later.

The hospital had exhausted April. It was normally her happy place. She had dealt with patients and the family of patients who were anxious about being in the hospital and feared it, but never really felt it for herself. Even when it had been about Samuel, the grief had outweighed anything else going on inside of her. But now she felt it all too clearly, the uneasy dread that had settled into the depths of her stomach and sunk her claws inside. It didn't want to go anywhere.

By the time that she finally left for the night, well past the end of visiting hours and after another long conversation with one of her father's doctors, she dragged herself to her mother's car to drive home. She was exhausted, physically and emotionally, and hungry. She just wanted to stuff her face with some of her mom's three cheese pasta and collapse into bed.

Jackson had finished his own meal and helped Karen clean the kitchen. The Kepner sisters had retired to their own bedrooms for the night, leaving it to just the two of them. Karen found some comfort in hearing Jackson's medical opinion in addition to April's.

When the front door to the house finally opened late in the evening, both Jackson and Karen looked over their shoulder to see April coming in, exhausted.

"Hi, sweetheart." Karen greeted, standing up with Harriet.

"Mo–Hattie–wha…" It took her a moment to process the fact that her mother had her daughter, looking past her to see Jackson seated on the couch. She blinked in surprise, stiffening and taking a deep breath to try and combat the sudden rigidity of her body. So he hadn't listened. She didn't know why she was surprised by that. "Hi."

"Hey, April." Jackson greeted with a soft smile.

"I didn't think you were coming." She expressed stiffly, stepping toward her mom.

"He changed his mind," Karen informed her, handing Harriet over to her mother. "Awfully sweet of him, isn't it? If I didn't know any better, I would have thought that divorced hadn't happened." She added.

Always the optimist, always hoping for better for her daughter, Karen couldn't help herself.

"Well, it did," April stated shortly.

"How is Joe doing?" Jackson questioned before things could become any tenser.

"The stents are holding up well," she answered, taking a deep breath and returning her gaze to her mother. "They just put it in the two arteries that I told you about, the ones that were ninety and one hundred percent blocked. His doctor wants to treat the one that's fifty percent with medicine and lifestyle changes, which he's going to need anyway. He'll have to take things easy around here, Mom. You get that, right?"

"Of course," Karen answered. "He's worked too hard his whole life, you know that. I've always told him that he needed to take it easy. Maybe now he'll finally listen to me."

"Hopefully," April agreed with a nod. "Is there any pasta leftover?" She asked.

Karen nodded. "Of course, honey, let me get you a plate." She said quickly.

"That's okay," Jackson interrupted, standing up from the couch. "I'll get it for her, Karen. I know that you're tired. Why don't you head to bed and I'll make sure everything gets cleaned up for the night?" He suggested.

"Oh, you're so sweet," Karen patted his cheek affectionately. "Thank you, Jackson. Goodnight."

Though perhaps a bit of it was out of the goodness of his heart, that was not his only intention when it came to making the offer. Truthfully, Jackson wanted a moment to talk to April alone even if he could tell by the dread across her expression that she did not feel the same way at the moment. It looked like he was still the absolute last person that she wanted to talk to about it. But with something like this, he couldn't stand her being mad at him. He knew that it was his fault, that he had put up that wall and refused to let her in on the other side of it. He hadn't stood by her, he hadn't respected her as she deserved. The argument that they had in the daycare had made it clear that his stance was belittling, in hindsight at least, and there was a lot they needed to talk about.

But he didn't say anything right off the bat, instead, moving to the kitchen quietly to get her a plate of food from the container in the fridge and sticking it into the microwave to heat it. He stood there and listened to her with Harriet – affectionate as ever, as if there wasn't a thing different about today. Even without glancing over at them over his shoulder, he couldn't help but just smile at the thought of the two of them. He knew with certainty that nothing between them would affect their parenting of their daughter, and that was something to be relieved about.

When the microwave beeped to announce it was done, Jackson was drawn back out of his thoughts. He grabbed a fork from the drawer for her and a napkin, setting it down on the kitchen table for her.

"It's ready," he said softly.

"Thanks," April muttered, sitting down and shifting Harriet to her left side so she could eat.

Jackson watched her for just a moment. He was going to offer to take Hattie from her, but it seemed like she was content to hold onto her regardless of it not being the most convenient position to eat in. After a few seconds of staring, he pulled out the chair across from her and sat down with her. He didn't say anything just yet, giving her the opportunity to scarf down a few bites.

"What are you really doing here, Jackson?" She finally questioned after a few minutes.

"I'm here for you, April," he answered seriously.

"Since when?" April snapped back harshly. "Because you've been acting like I'm a monster for the past few days for doing what my boss asked me. I don't see what about that has changed. I asked you to stay home with Harriet and you said you would. Now you're the one going back on your word."

Even though Jackson had already known this wasn't going to be an easy conversation for either of them, he hadn't quite expected that to leave her mouth. He took a deep breath. Getting too angry in front of Harriet was unwise.

"I know." He nodded slightly. "But what you're going through right now is bigger than that."

"I'm really tired, Jackson," April breathed out, dropping her fork. "I don't want to fight here."

"And I don't want to fight at all, April. I promise." He replied.

Her eyebrows raised. "Really?"

"Of course not," Jackson answered, leaning forward with his arms on the table. "I never want to fight with you. It's just… it seems like more often than not, that's where we go when we're not on the same page. We've never been good at talking it out. Right now, that's on me, I know that. But we both have those moments when we shut down, you know? You shut down after Samuel. I shut down after the divorce. It happens." He was trying to be as honest as possible without letting any of the words be delivered too cruelly.

The mention of Samuel still caused April to freeze for a moment.

"Yeah, I did." She wet her lips uncomfortably. "And I guess right now, we both kind of shut down. I guess it's just… that middle ground. We don't really have it. And we need it now more than ever, not just for us." Her head dropped down, kissing Harriet's curls.

"We do," Jackson agreed with a nod of her head. "Which is why I want to be honest with you."

"Honest about what?" April questioned.

"The reason that I've been especially… uptight the past few weeks with you, and doing what Bailey asked of you. Why I saw it as you turning my back. I've been seeing that everywhere I look, I guess because I found my father. He lives in Montana. Just… a couple of hours away." _Not giving a shit about me_. The words almost leave his lips, barely filtering out the curse words for their daughter sitting there, sleepily on her mother's lap.

"Oh, Jackson…" she breathed out, blinking quickly. "You could have told me. You know you could have told me. That… you're right. Now everything you've been doing in the past few weeks makes perfect sense." That was her flaw, wasn't it? She ran away from the confrontation of problems, one way or another. Just like his father had run away from the pressure of being an Avery. "I'm so sorry."

He shook his head. "You don't need to apologize. I could have told you and I didn't. That's on me, not you. There's no way that you could have known." He expressed earnestly.

"Still, I feel like I should have put it together…" April shook her head. "And that's not all I'm sorry for. I'm sorry that we haven't been able to talk out things in the past like we should have. I guess I've always wanted to blame that on you but it's me, too. I don't talk to you when I should. I talk to God when sometimes all that I really needed to do was sit down and talk with my husband." There was a sheepish smile on her lips, not at all concealed by her bottom lip caught between her top teeth.

"I'm not perfect either," Jackson shrugged. "I make snap judgments about a situation and I stick with them. I did about you going to Jordan, and when you didn't tell me right off the bat about Harriet. We both have our flaws."

"I want to do better. For all of us." She admitted honestly.

"Me too."

Both of them fell quiet for a moment and April reached across the table for him. Jackson's larger hand wrapped around hers easily, giving it a soft squeeze. He had been right to come out here. Even if it wasn't the most predictable time to talk about their problems, April couldn't help but be grateful. Growing up, she had idolized her parent's relationship, even if it looked nothing like the one that she and Jackson had, and she knew that he had been her greatest love. But she wanted that for Harriet, to see and admire love from her parents, to have that wonderful kind of example.

"I want better for Harriet, but I want better for us, too," April finally spoke after a few quiet moments. "I want her to have a healthy family dynamic. I want us to have one, too. I know that we don't always act like a divorced couple and that my mom is… surprisingly, this time, not completely unfounded with her commentary about our relationship." A smile softened her words.

"I've always wanted to try again with you, April," Jackson confessed. "Since you let me feel her kick that first time. I got to see how happy you were and I remembered all of it. How much I loved you, why I loved you. Even if we have our issues… I never stopped loving you."

Tears glistened in her eyes for just a moment, remembering the moment between them.

"And you are still my best friend and my favorite person. That hasn't changed." He spoke again.

"Yeah, I guess it hasn't. You're still mine, too." Though April chewed slightly at her bottom lip as she stared back at him, she couldn't contain the smile that was threatening to break across her cheeks at the honesty that was coming from him. It had been a long time since they had spoken to each other like this.

"I know that we still have our problems and that recognizing them and apologizing them is just… the first of a few steps to getting past them, but I think it might be worth giving it a chance, you know?" Jackson continued.

April stared at him for a long moment, making sure she was hearing him right. "Do you want to try again?"

"I do," he confirmed slowly with a nod of his head.

She squeezed his hand so tightly her own shook. "Yeah, I would like that very much, Jackson."

Her late-night dinner was finished up with a little more energy than she had before, feeling slightly lighter than the taxing day had allowed her to. Maybe it was just a start, but this was the first time that they had really talked about their problems openly and without hurting one another. That was huge. They had tried couples therapy and it had been a complete bust. She hadn't known who to blame for that – him for not trying, herself for being too late… but now, that didn't seem to matter quite as much. They could try again in a normal, healthy way. Maybe it would work this time.

Jackson and April both fell asleep together in her childhood bedroom, Harriet in the crib. They were both fully clothed, though pressed tightly together, his arm around her waist and holding her close.

It was an intimacy resurfaced between them that had previously seemed long forgotten.


End file.
